Who are they )A Certain Ratio

i'd say post-punk for da genre...

bingo. post punk out of manchester(?) that are obcessed with rhythm of the Africana movement. 23 Skidoo, Cabaret Voltaire, The Pop Group, they all have the same kind of vibe working for them.

they aren't are intense or hectoring as the pop group though...

man, i love the shits out of "Y"

There's a nice 2CD set out called EARLY,an anthology of sorts,on SoulJazzRecords.

acrmcr.com

"do the du" is an amazing (like AMAZING!) track. the lyrics are so snide and wonderful and the very tight funk rhythm section just blows me away every time. such a simple song but so interesting to listen to. apparently ACR just reformed for a gig in london somewhere ... who has info?

also the guitar player was involved in the making of "24 hr party people" as some sort of acting coach (maybe for lip-syncing?)

acr good. pop group and 23 skidoo better.

no way is pop group better. they're scary.

scary???? they're POP!

Joy Division fans shouldn't be without their early material - Wilson was molding them into JD Jr.. "Flight" is far and away their best tune, fucking magical combination of Hannett's spooky production and late-60s funk.

From the Souljazz records website mentioned above:
'Again mixing Punk with dance and a large dose of Marxist philosophy, The Gang of Four were initially released on the Edinburgh based independent label, Fast (as were The Human League). As we can see, Punk music affected every city in England.'
Yes and obviously that town in Scotland too. The one that's the capital city.

ACR were actually the subject of a song by another Manchester group of the era, The Passage - 'A Certain Way To Go' from the album 'Pindrop'. It was a slagging off of them though, probably based on personal encounters, and doesn't sound anything like anything like ACR (not a pastiche or pisstake).

I can't think of any other groups offhand that have been attacked in other bands' songs - especially in these litiginous times.....any takers ?
Actually I've just realised that TONS of rap/hip-hop is probably riddled with this....

Here I am! I didn't know that this was a slag-off actually. Andy Wilson has just surfaced on The Passage thread - he might know.

Maybe we should move this over to The Passage thread - though AW turning up there has scared the hell out of me...

The lyrics are quite difficult to hear through that production, but I *think* they include lines like:
'They look divine... deep coats, military hair...they were spread in a line for us to admire them...they stood stuck together like a bunch of keys....'
'... the things they said were the most exclusive words, mainly 'I Love Me'....we asked them if they bothered that their songs were full of lies...they stared through us like statuettes and dummies don't reply...'
'...no time for others, they're their own lovers, a feast for eyes, a famine for ears...'

I thought I'd read in a (rare!) interview at the time of Pindrop that the song was a slag-off of ACR, but maybe that was just the journo's interpretation and not a quotation.

Actually, maybe it was more of a slag-off of the typical Manc- Misery Long Mac Brigade sub-culture that had developed over the previous 2 years around the whole Factory/Post-Punk thing.